Chapter 396: Cycles and Charts

Xia Duo looked at the mirror surface and checked all its connections to the Magic Net String. With his magical attainments, he was unexpectedly unable to discover what use this mirror had for the moment!

Thus, he asked Tilake, "What effect has been added to this mirror?"

"A magic effect!" Tilake said with a look of certainty.

"..." Xia Duo was speechless, then asked, "I am asking what specific effect it has?"

"It is now a Magic Item!"

After repeating it twice, Xia Duo finally understood what Tilake meant. It turned out this thing was just an ordinary mirror, only it could be recognized by a Spellcaster as a Magic Item!

Looking at the Mithril patterns on the mirror surface, Xia Duo inwardly lamented the waste. Once this Mithril was fused with other materials, it could never be separated again; at least, Netheril had not mastered the technology to refine Mithril.

However, on the surface, he still had to praise Tilake a few times. After all, in less than two months, they had created a real Magic Item, even if this Magic Item was of no use.

Even the mirror's basic function—reflection—had become blurry and unclear because of the Mithril patterns on the surface!

"Are there any others?"

"The others all have various defects and cannot maintain a constant magic effect."

Xia Duo nodded and said nothing more. Afterward, he read through the experimental records in detail, gaining a more concrete understanding of the progress of this Constant Magic Project, while also discovering where the difficulties of this project lay.

What he had initially thought would yield results quickly now seemed somewhat unrealistic.

Constant Spell, or constant magic, regardless of how much difference there was in actual effect, was essentially the same principle: the cycle of spell elements.

The initial starting point could be attributed to the Ring Spell 【Arcane Mark】, but 【Arcane Mark】 only involved the surface of the Magic Net, and it was merely an operational cycle of Magic Net Strings.

Yet constant magic and Constant Spell not only involved the deep layers of the Magic Net, but besides the operational cycle of Magic Net Strings, there was also an energy cycle.

The operational cycle of Magic Net Strings related to whether the magic was constant, while the energy cycle related to whether the magic existed at all. Without stable energy, naturally, no magic effect could exist for long.

If only the operational cycle of Magic Net Strings was achieved, then it would only possess the magic effect of "having a magic effect," similar to 【Arcane Mark】.

Only above that would there be an energy cycle, and a specific magic effect would appear.

It seemed Tilake was stuck at this step. The macroscopic understanding was indeed very simple, but the specific operational principles were actually not clear.

This could actually be attributed to the deficiencies of the current Netheril Magic System. Regarding this, Xia Duo had no good solution for the time being.

Because the best method was to let a large number of grassroots Mages constantly explore and expand the breadth of existing theories and technologies, thereby deriving a magic tree similar to a technology tree; this was the correct way for magic to develop.

After encouraging Tilake once more, Xia Duo prepared to leave. He also had an appointment with the Tower of Time's Supervisor of Personnel, Mage Depake, to discuss the independence of the "Study Group" personnel relations.

This was the prelude to the transformation of the Tower of Time. Xia Duo had to communicate with the relevant people in advance. Besides Depake, he also had to arrange meetings with other supervisors of the Tower of Time.

In fact, as long as he mastered personnel and supplies, that would be enough, but Xia Duo did not want the Tower of Time to experience turmoil, so probing the bottom and communicating in advance was very necessary.

Of course, the most important thing was Niya's opinion. Xia Duo was currently only the Acting Tower Master; he could decide daily affairs on his own, but when it involved the transformation of the Tower of Time, even if Niya had released the Permission Level, he still had to notify her in advance.

However, he was confident he could persuade Niya.

Four o'clock in the afternoon, at Depake's place.

Knowing Xia Duo was coming, Depake had cleared his schedule in advance. While waiting, his mind kept pondering the previous prompt from the Tower Spirit—Xia Duo had created a new Permission Level named "Study Group."

Depake did not know the specific scope of the permission, but he had heard of the name "Study Group" long ago. It was just a small group formed by Apprentices; how did it suddenly get involved with a new Permission Level of the Tower of Time?

"Xia Duo—" Depake murmured.

He had a good impression of this young man who grew extremely rapidly, but precisely because of that rapid growth, he actually did not know much about Xia Duo. Or rather, before he had time to understand him in detail, Xia Duo had suddenly become an Intermediate Mage like him, and had also become Niya's husband.

Just as he was considering what the deep meaning behind Xia Duo's actions this time might be, Depake suddenly felt a jolt of energy. Someone had triggered the Magic Alarm at the door, and he immediately reacted—Xia Duo had arrived.

After opening the door, it was indeed Xia Duo standing there. Depake took the initiative to greet him, "Mage Xia Duo, welcome, welcome, please come in!"

"Good afternoon, Mage Depake." Xia Duo replied casually and followed Depake into the Reception Room.

The two sat opposite each other. Depake took the initiative to ask, "Is Mage Xia Duo here this time because of the 'Study Group'?"

"Yes!" Xia Duo nodded. Since Depake was so proactive, there was no need for him to beat around the bush, so he directly ordered the Tower Spirit to project the price changes of Magic Items in all of Netheril over the last hundred years or so between the two, represented in the form of a line chart.

"Mage Depake, please take a look at this chart first. This is the change curve of Magic Items in Netheril over the last hundred years. I only took the average prices of low-rank magic potions and low-rank and Intermediate Mage Scrolls from those years. These prices are relatively stable and easier to look up."

From the chart, one could very intuitively see the price fluctuations over the last hundred years. Overall, it was in a downward trend, and the magnitude was not large. Furthermore, except for one very violent fluctuation point, the rest of the price fluctuations were relatively weak.

Xia Duo pointed to that very violent fluctuation point and explained: "This was one hundred and twenty years ago, the historical high price. Mage Depake must be very clear about what happened in those years."

Depake nodded, indicating he understood. In fact, if you asked any Netherese, they would know that over a hundred years ago, the Netherese wiped out the largest Orc tribes within their territory.

Since then, the Nether Core Region had almost no threat from an Orc Tide.

In those years, wars were frequent, and the prices of Magic Items reached the historical high of modern times. Of course, at that time, neither the Savile Territory nor the Tower of Time existed.

It was not even certain if the Great Arcanist Savil had been born yet!

It was only because Xia Duo, as a modern person, was more sensitive to data that he was able to summarize a thing or two from the various miscellaneous essays and biographies in the Library of the Tower of Time.

Next, Xia Duo explained the small fluctuations one by one, all of which were linked to various historical events. Of course, there were many far-fetched components in this, but Xia Duo mainly did it to illustrate the reliability of this chart.

As for the overall downward trend of Magic Item prices, it was unquestionable, and it was also something that could be inferred under normal thinking; it was just that no one had summarized and drawn such a statistical analysis chart that looked impressive at first glance like Xia Duo had.

Depake was indeed somewhat bluffed, but confusion followed, "Then, Mage Xia Duo, what connection is there between the falling prices of Magic Items and the 'Study Group'?"